


Memories of the Red-Crowned Cranes

by Edo_Hikaro



Series: The Rose-Coloured Path [2]
Category: Bleach, Original Work
Genre: Afterlife, Alternate Canon, Buddhism, Canon Rewrite, F/M, Fairy Tale Retellings, Folklore, Gen, Heaven, Japanese Culture, Japanese Mythology & Folklore, M/M, Mysticism, Other, Past Relationship(s), Post-Canon, Post-Thousand Year Blood War Arc, Reincarnation, Religious Imagery & Symbolism, Shinto, Supernatural Elements, Symbolism
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-08-03
Updated: 2019-08-03
Packaged: 2020-05-14 07:41:34
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,833
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/19268773
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Edo_Hikaro/pseuds/Edo_Hikaro
Summary: SERIES NOTE: Kyouraku Shunsui, when he was Taichou of the Eighth, used to write a novel called 'The Rose-Coloured Path' for the Seireitei Communication which was very unpopular. He was never bothered by its poor reception. Nanao and Lisa decided to re-release it in parts as an anthology of selected short tales, and see whether rank-and-file shinigami of the Gotei, after all that had happened to them in recent years, would now respond differently to his novel.IN THIS TALE:“Who were you?” he murmured wonderingly, his heart strumming. “Why do you always seem to know me?”The crane could not reply, of course. There were many things he could make in this place, but speech for animals was not one of them.UPDATED: 3 August 2019- with details from the prequel series to 'In All, But Blood' I'm working on. And also to correct missing paragraphs from the last posting error.





	Memories of the Red-Crowned Cranes

**Author's Note:**

> **First posted:** 18 June 2019.
> 
> A lyrical ode to an idea that's besetting me and distracting me from completing Part 4 of the ongoing '[In All, But Blood](https://archiveofourown.org/series/1201744)' series. Takes place in that same universe, contains a reference to a detail in Part 1, '[Unforgivable, Regrettable](https://archiveofourown.org/works/16792792/chapters/39412645)".
> 
> The Red-Crowned Crane is one of the two rarest large cranes of the animal world, and endangered. Half of the world's population now live in Hokkaido, Japan. They mate for life, and form a pair bond. Because of this, in this little lore, they could be any combination of characters who used to be central to Ukitake's life. I'm toying with the question of whether a pair of them could be Shiba Kaien and his wife Miyako who both used to serve in the Thirteenth under Ukitake.
> 
> Many thanks to Peter Cavanagh whose bird photography perfectly captured the reason why the Japanese Crane has been enshrined in Japanese mythology, and is a symbol of beauty, longevity and fidelity. See his wonderfully evocative photography [here](http://www.petercavanagh.us/home/themes/red-crowned-cranes/#jp-carousel-880). Watching BBC's Wild Japan also helps deepen appreciation of this majestic bird, and the mysticism surrounding it.
> 
> [Shiba Inu](https://www.akc.org/dog-breeds/shiba-inu/) is the national dog breed of Japan.
> 
> Updates will continue when I see fit to add in details that could not be fleshed out in the main story arc. Or to bring more details into this little folklore to give it more dimension. For instance, my dear Russian friend just reminded me how we used to have to be quiet to avoid scaring the grass carps in the River Don. So I've redone the bit on grass carps.

**Snow was blowing, the whole world was white.** From skies to land, nothing was visible save flurries of swirling white flakes.

He ploughed through loose banks of icy, dry powder, lifting his knees high with each step, for his legs would sink to the shins of his pale mukluks. Under the lush, thick tent of his long fur cloak he was warm, the lower half of his face, his throat and his chest snugly wrapped within the thick plush of his white fur muffler. But his bare hands were frozen, for he had removed his gloves to better grip his heavy wicker basket of fresh fish against his stomach. Freezing crosswinds blew through the opened lower front of his fur protection, biting through his quilted long yukata to pinch at him through his layers of kimono and underrobes, but he paid the discomfort no heed.

After all, he was nearing his destination.

The calls were echoing through the swirling snowfall, the sounds becoming more distinct with every laborious step he took.

Pausing, he lifted his gaze to see if the callers were already visible, and thought he spied the clouds of their forms moving within the foggy white flurries ahead.

Then the winds changed direction and blew against his back.

Smiling, he raised his offerings into the air to let the currents carry their tantalising scents forward. Of paddy fields, and verdant flats where spring rivers flooded soft, rich plains in perpetual spring.

Where every morning, requiring nothing more startling than his soft smile, white-bellied, bronze-scaled grass carps leapt from gentle waters into his hands and from his hands, into his basket.

For in this place, even what looked like death was not death, merely a mimicry of it to keep souls in a semblance of all that were once familiar.

A simple Kidou spell kept the freshly sacrificed bodies of the carps soft and juicy for his daily trek into the freezing winter place. 

Message sent, he lowered his basket and with one hand, propped its weight against his hip. His other hand pushed back the voluminous, heavy fur hood of his cloak, and drew his fur muffler down from his face and wedged the thick plush edges beneath his chin. His face now fully exposed, his vision was unhindered. Heedless of the freezing winter winds stinging his skin, he looked around to see what he could see.

All about him as far as his gaze could reach, there was only a featureless white world swirling and moaning with flying white flakes. There was nothing save a long, shallow swathe in the smooth blanket of white behind him, where the heavy hems of his long fur cloak had trailed. Even as he watched, his trail was disappearing, covered beneath new, falling snow.

He had kept every season in this place, and every variation of spring, summer, autumn and winter that he could remember – and for him, that meant all variants of every season he ever lived through. They were all now in this place, each season and its variant replete with its equinox or solstice. He had made each season simultaneous with one another, so that each season occupied its own domain and segued seamlessly with its neighbouring season, and the creatures accompanying him in this place could migrate from one season to another at their whims and fancies and feel that they were living their old lives on a more blessed plane.

The only assistance he required was with summer. He was of water and lightning, and his lightning bolts were too brief to create lasting heat.

So for summer, he had help. And it was the happiest moment of his arrival, for his father was here, in a new position with a new mission, and he had been waiting for him. Their reunion was joyous, and for the first time that his perfect memory could remember, stout rivers of tears fell down his father’s wizened face as his strong wiry arms gathered him up into a snug and safe embrace as though he had never grown up. And afterwards, he had lived with his father for a little while, and spent time with him that he never had the chance to.

 Then his soul had begun to hear a call, and he had delayed until he could delay no more, and had to heed the beckoning for him to move on. His father had been inconsolably grieved, for their parting was the final one, and permanent, and thus, loathed to separate, he had accompanied him on his journey, arduous though it was. For him, he encountered no trouble for the way opened to him, as if recognising him, but for his father, he pled and begged every sentinel of the two hundred and sixteen barriers to allow his father passage, and rights of visit for his father and his friends. And each sentinel, hearing his voice, had required of him to sing to them until they were satisfied before they would accede, and so he had sung, with all his heart, with all the skill he could muster, until they passed through the last barrier and arrived at the edge of this place.

But their arrival had been the most curious thing, for what greeted their eyes was a half-finished sort of world.

Even more curious, was how he had immediately known that this half-finished world was his own work, which he left uncompleted a long time ago because he had to leave. He no longer knew why he had to leave, yet he knew that knowledge was permanently taken away from him for his own sake. He also knew what he had to do to complete his world.

So he had made them a temporary shelter at the edge of the incomplete world, then set to work. And when his father saw that he needed help with summer, he had immediately lent his aid. His father was of great elemental fire, yet his heat could be as finely tuned as he wished. Thus summer was made, and all the variants of summer.

While he lived with his father, he became acquainted for the first time with Tenjirou-sama, of whom he had heard much but never met until he awoke in his father’s new house. Yet, Tenjirou-sama seemed to know him well. Midway in his work, Tenjirou-sama came to visit, and seeing what he was doing, offered the sacred waters of his Kirinden as the source from which life and healing could flow to his creation.

But he had courteously declined.

For he was of water and lightning, hence he could bring forth life to this place. And since his final awakening, he had needed no healing.

He had been healed. Completely.

More than that, he was able to share his perfect health and wellness with every soul he met, and every place he went. Thus in this place, where he was finishing his work, every creature was always well. Every creature did not die.

He kept only an illusion of the cycle of life and death to furnish a comforting semblance of mortality for the sake of the fragile, limited perceptions of the creatures who would accompany him in this place. But in truth, in this place, every pebble, every grain of sand, every bamboo leaf, had a soul. And each soul was eternal, and unchanging. He knew every one of them, for as soon as he completed their home, their souls awakened and they spoke and sang to him with soft joy and love. Hence, in this place, all souls loved him, and he loved them in return. There was nothing here that did not love, nothing here that could not be loved.

And, if he did not let himself think more on it, it was enough.

It was enough to be loved by a world which he loved in return. Enough that his father and Tenjirou-sama could only come to visit once every hundred years.

The calls were louder now, coming closer.

They had been noticed. He, and his basket of fresh grass carps.

A crosswind blew a long tress of his hair across his face, obscuring his vision. He drew it away and tucked it behind his ear, feeling momentarily wry at the sight of his own white strands.

His body was now completely healed, yet his tresses had remained as white as snow, rather than regain the ebony he was born with. So long ago.

So, so long ago.

Another lifetime and another world away.

A world whose sights, sounds, scents and sensations he brought into this place, where he replicated them across his domain exactly as he remembered them. Myriads upon myriads of colours, sounds, scents and feelings, all of them crafted and placed into this world from his memory.

And they were exact replicas, he knew, for his memory was still perfect, still eidetic.

Yet none was like him.

In this place, colours did not stay on him, despite his best efforts. Save for his eyes which remained dark, his brows and lashes which remained ebony, and his skin which remained a pale ivory, he could not bring any other colour to himself. His fur cloak and mukluks were a deep sable when he first made them, but they turned white the first time he put them on, and stayed white ever since. His home was of rich mahogany timber when he first made it, but as soon as he moved in, its very wood bleached into a bone white. The only colours he could ever put on himself and on his things were varying shades of pale and whites.

Such a strange, inexplicable, though tiny and harmless limitation put upon him in this place.

The calls were very clear now, resounding through the flying snowflakes. The deepest of them released a long, ardent honk of welcome and happiness.

He stood with his long hair flying in the winds, letting their movements signal his position. He was all white, and shades of it. He would be camouflaged against the snow if he was completely still.

And then the callers began to appear.

A whiter, black-speckled wave was taking shape from within the flurrying white skies of snow.

Soon, the wave was shaping into a flock, denser and larger than it was yesterday. Then the flock became distinct, separating into shapes of majestic, pure white powerful bodies flying airborne between great wingspans of black-tipped pure white, with long, graceful ebony necks and long, rapier sharp beaks outstretched, locating him by sight and scent.

In a few breaths, the flock began to descend around him, the black edges of the inner halves of their great flapping wings stark against the white swirling skies, the crimson crowns of their elegantly curved heads becoming visible they landed in gliding runs upon the powdery white snow, sending plumes of white drifts up beneath their great talons, arching and dipping their long elegant necks at him in noisy greetings as they passed him.

He answered them with a welcoming smile, and a lift of his heavily laden wicker basket, and their crimson crowns flared blood-red in excitement against their white, snowing world when they saw his gifts.

Then they were all surrounding him, fearless of him, the feathery flapping of their great wings deafening him as they jostled for space to reach him.

Large were their pure-white bodies, yet they stalked atop the powdering snow, never sinking in. It was just as well, for he was standing shin-deep, and that lowered him to eye-level with them.

Then the tallest of them jostled all others aside and drew close to him, flapping its great white and black-skirted wings, a snowy giant fan edged with black towards its large, muscular body. The crest of skin on its head flared more vividly crimson than it had yesterday, and as it honked loudly, territorially, it was the same deep, ardent cry that resounded while the flock was still in the skies.  

On long slate-grey legs, did the tall, male crane stalked close about him, ringing him, completely fearless. Raising its long elegant ebony neck, it turned its finely curved ebony-cheeked head to one side and peered down at him with one shining, obsidian eye, its long olive-green rapier beak leaning dangerously close to his face.

Seeming to recognise him once more.

Reaching into his basket slowly, to show he was not a threat, he selected the biggest, fattest carp, and picked it up, holding it out towards the large, male crane in offering.

“Lunch?” he asked softly, with a gentle smile.

The sharp point of that piercing beak came close, and very delicately, very carefully, with evident fear of hurting him, it picked the fish out of his hand.

He laughed, delighted.

Stooping, once more keeping his movement smooth and slow, he rested his basket upon the snow at his knees, and began distributing the carps. Dropping a little reiatsu into his fingertips, he threw them one by one to his majestic, feathery diners all around, his controlled strength sending each slippery lunch arcing unerringly across the distance from him to each crane.

A chaotic chorus of excited honking answered him, and the cranes flocking and once more jostling each other to snatch up his gifts and lustily tear into them with sheer joy. He laughed in pleasure when several of his lunch guests displayed great artistry as they danced around him and speared the slippery bronze fish right out of mid-air with precise, lightning fast jabs of sharp, rapier beaks and long ebony necks.

Soon, his wicker basket was empty, and his guests were all flapping their wings and tearing into their  fresh carps with great relish.

He had understood from his very first time that white-bellied grass carps were their favourite. He had given all creatures in this place the semblance of mortality so that they could eat for the sheer joy of it, rather than for survival. No creature truly needed to eat, in this place.

The largest, tallest male lingered close to him however, chasing away other males with a honk or a feint from its long dangerous beak, or flaring and flapping its wings in clear warnings of possession. It was remembering its territoriality yesterday, and each day before that, and it always marked him as its own.

Chuckling lightly, he allowed it its idiosyncrasies, as he always did. Nothing owned any soul in this place. Himself, least of all.

But if this large, majestic bird wished to own him, he would indulge his possessive bird friend.

Bending for the final time, he scrubbed his hands in the powdery snow, then clapped his palms to beat off the fine freezing powder.

They never melted upon his warmer bare skin. And once again, he idly wondered why.

There was nothing more to do now, except enjoy the company of his great, feathery lunch guests. Gathering the volumes of his thick fur cloak close, he piled its heavy, plush folds into a makeshift seat, then pulled his layers of robes about himself and folded down onto his seat. He no longer wore hakama, so he drew both his legs beneath him and laid them to one side, one inner thigh over the inside of his other ankle, keeping the front of his robes closed and the warm air in.

He was completely healed, yet he still could not withstand much cold, even in this life.

The tall male crane paused in devouring its lunch and observed him with one concerned, obsidian eye.

He stoked his seat of thick, furry white mink pelt, which was not truly pelt, but formed to feel like it.

There were many creative freedoms he could take with this place. Within its mild limitations.

“Would you like to sit beside me?” he asked his worried-looking bird friend. He quirked a side of his mouth into rueful smile. “You do not like your friends to come close to me. Yet I wish for the warmth of company.”

As if understanding his words, the male crane slurped down the rest of its meal, then gracefully stalked towards him. Ruffling its great white feathers, it adjusted its wings so that their black secondary feathers hung over the end of its back in that distinctive marking of its kind, then folded its long legs and sank onto the powdery snow close beside him, the white feathers of its large, warm body lightly touching his robes.

Their eyes were now level.

Then, startling him, the crane curved its long slim neck and rested its head upon his shoulder, rubbing its crimson crown gently against the plush fur protecting his throat.

It had never done this before.

Carefully, he raised a hand and lightly touched its black neck.

The ebony feathers were stiff, but silky and fine.

He was further surprised when the curved head upon his shoulder curled inwards onto itself, then rubbed the crimson red skin upon its crown against the side of his face. Through the locks of his own hair, he could feel its roughness.

Tentatively, he increased his touch, deepening his light strokes into a soothing, gentle rub on the long elegant black neck.

“Who were you?” he murmured wonderingly, his heart strumming. “Why do you always seem to know me?”

The crane could not reply, of course. There were many things he could make in this place, but speech for animals was not one of them.

Like he was unable to put colours on himself.

However, it seemed speech was not the only way living things expressed themselves in this place. For the crane lifted its curving, elegant head on its long neck, and glanced askance at him with suddenly keen eyes.

With a soft rustling of feathers, it spread its great wings, stretching until its wingspan spread fully on both sides of them. Then it curved its wings down, sheltering both of them, encircling him within, almost cradling him against its majestic white-feathered chest.

His heart skipped a beat.

_Could it be…?_

But immediately, he denied the thought.

It could not be.

The one who held half of his soul was still alive, still serving those he had left behind.

And would do so for many more centuries to come.

Many more thousands of years to come.

He stared up at the crane, wondering. Wondering if he dared to hope.

This life had not released him from the burden of hope.

And the burden of dreams.

He had not met another one like himself since he completed his world and came to live in this place. No soul seemed able to come here, save for his father, Tenjirou-sama, and those others who were already with them in their place, all of them arrived earlier than he. After his final awakening into this existence, no one else had followed him.

Sadness rose in his heart.

“Am I the last?” he asked the crane softly.

The obsidian eyes of the bird looked at him, unable to reply in words.

He smiled at it comfortingly, or perhaps it was to comfort himself. Reaching out his hand, he stroked the white, silky feathers upon the crane’s chest, where it felt like soft down compared to the feathers of its neck.

Arching its neck down in a graceful curve, the crane nudged its head lightly against his hand, moving his fingers to where it desired to be scratched.

Amused, he grinned at the large bird and gave it a good scratch and then, for good measure, a series of soothing, massaging strokes.

Thus they stayed companionably for several moments, him scratching where the crane moved his hand, the crane turning its head to one side to regard him with obsidian eyes that were becoming more aware as heartbeats passed.

It made him wonder.

He could no longer deny he was lonely. These breathtaking, beautiful birds had been his companions since he completed his creations and entered his dwelling to rest. He knew he was lonely because he had unconsciously made this place for more than just he alone. But no one had come. And he had lost track of how much time had passed. When his father next came to visit, an eternity could have passed and he would not even know it.

For time was of no consequence here. Save for reminding him that he was alone in this place, in this world he made, waiting for the one who held half his soul, and for those he once knew.

Memories seeped into his mind, each as clear as if he had only experienced them yesterday. Of faces he had known, of places he had been to, and of love and friendships he had had. Upon the heels of them, came memories of pain, of illness, of grief and loss and heartaches.

A perfect memory was both a blessing and a curse.

So softly, he began to sing.

Lightly, at first, a merest breath on the winds, only for the purpose of consoling himself. Then as he fell into the song from memory, he released his voice more ardently, feeling the sounds well from deep within his diaphragm and hearing them carry into the winds.

It was a song he wrote in the first century of his previous life, filling in the words of a poem to an [ichigenkin](http://www.ichigenkin.com/philosophy.html) manuscript he once composed for his father about the ceaseless cycles of the bloom and fall of sakura flowers.

He had only ever sung it to three other souls.

And now, his majestic crane protector and friend was the fourth.

As he brought his song to a close, he became aware of a quiet. Curious, he peered around the edge of a sheltering wing, and widened his eyes in surprise.

The flock had settled down, no longer competing against each other for the carp. They were either standing and listening, or strolling through the falling snow, shaking their fine, curved red-crowned heads to keep the falling flakes out of their eyes.

In the white mists of the falling snow, they ranged about him like a phalanx of elegant, pure white guardians dotted with crimson hats and streaked with black tails.

The wing about him lowered, then withdrew as his crane protector folded its wings back upon itself. It looked at him once, then rose soundlessly on its slate-grey taloned feet, and walked away.

When it reached a short distance away from him, it lifted its chest and, raising its beak into the softly falling snow, honked once, then twice, and began to dance.

Lengthening its neck then curving it down, its long legs leapt in low jumps into the air as it flapped its great wings in rhythm, while its long beak rose skywards and its ebony throat arched backwards to honk in sheer joy to a music only it could hear. As it leapt and spun, it intermittently flashed an obsidian eye to look at him, encouraging him.

It was dancing for him.

Joy filled him.

He began to sing again. A cheerful song this time, even humorous, about two souls who once followed him about like a pair of faithful, dedicated, though rather nosy shiba inu who endlessly competed with each other for his approval.

As if understanding to whom he was referring, the crane danced in a parody of the male member of that pair of long ago souls, rising on the toes of its large talons and spinning in place with its chest puffed out, holding out its wings in an approximation of fisted hands on hips, all the while honking nosily. Exactly like how that soul used to speak.

Its mimicry of the memory quickly drew the attention and focus of another.

A young, yet unbonded female crane, only two-thirds the size of the male, with the pearl-grey neck of females of its kind.

He had encountered that female several times before, though it was always the male who approached him first.

The female crane leapt into the snowy arena and began encircling the preening male, holding its wings up at an angle as if clapping hands over its ears at the deafening honking of its male counterpart, swaying its pearl-grey neck from side to side as if in disapproval.

It was funny, and endearing, and so reminiscent of the two whom he sang about that he had to pause in his song, for he was helpless with laughter.

And a stark, stark recognition.

It dawned on him like a new cold, and a great warmth, both flooding him at once without separation.

For suddenly, he knew who they were.

Smiling broadly, he decided to see if they remembered everything.

If their new Reiou, at least, had allowed him this much.

Picking up his hems, he rose to his feet and deliberately, with pure muscle memory of how it once used to afflict him, allowed his limbs to tremble, and his stance to wobble.

Instantly, with a great furious feathery flapping, the male crane was at his side, shoring him up with its own body so that he would not fall. And the female crane was before him in a heartbeat after, lending him a point of support in the form of its arched back.

He no longer had any doubt.

For a brief heartbeat, grief pierced his heart at what this meant.

The pair had to leave everyone as well. Left everything they knew and had.

And they had left while their life cycles had not been entirely purified, or they would not awaken here as cranes.

Had they done so in order to find him? To return to him?

But this present reunion with him was perhaps an indication that their new Reiou had finally regained memory of what they once were to each other, and given him this kindness.

He ran his fingers through the softer feathers of the female crane, feeling its slighter body lean into his touch. At his side, the male crane jostled for his attention in that age-old competitiveness that still stayed, despite it all.

“But you had your scratch already,” he laughed softly, gently scratching the ebony neck, nevertheless.

The male crane stretched its neck up, indicating another spot.

Well, it certainly was a spoiled one in this life.

Momentarily, he wondered how long they would stay with him. It was only because red-crowned cranes were longer-lived than other species of large cranes that folklore made them out to live for one thousand years, when the truth was they tended to live for merely forty or fifty years, while his life was… in this place, he was eternal.

But in this place he made, nothing died for real. Those carps were already back in the waters from where they had leapt into his hands this dawn, as if they had never done so and bearing no memory of each day’s sacrifice.

“So you found your way back to me,” he softly told the male crane, smiling when it flapped its great wings in pure joy.

“I am happy too,” he replied.

Clearly, it, too, was happy that it was remembering. And that he remembered it in turn.

“How can I ever forget you?” he asked rhetorically, chuckling once more.

Then there was a definitive bump against his front.

He looked down.

The female crane bumped against him once more.

With his other hand, he stroked the back of the long, beautiful pearl-grey neck.

“I remember you as well,” he assured with a fond smile.

The female crane honked in joy, a higher-pitched sound than her male counterpart.

It made him wonder who else were returned to him in this way. In such forms.

If the one who held half his soul would ever make it here.

And if so, in what form?

But at least, until then, he was no longer completely alone in this place he made.

Time was of no consequence here.

So he would wait.

Feeling lighter in a way that made him understand that he had been bearing a weight in his heart all along, he raised the plush, heavy hood of his not-mink fur cloak back over his head, gathered up his empty basket, then turned to retrace his steps.

He had not gone a few paces when something made him pause to look back.

The pair of male and female cranes had followed him only a few steps.

They looked hesitant, unable to leave their flock.

With an abrupt, crystal clarity, he understood what he had to do.

He would have to return here to see them everyday, to talk to them and be with them, until they both awakened enough to leave their lives as mere birds.

Perhaps, in time, he could even help them regain their abilities to speak.

He smiled at them, waving his hand once.

“I shall come back tomorrow,” he called out gently.

The birds visibly shifted, relaxing.

“Goodbye for now, Sentarou. See you soon, Kiyone.”

**Author's Note:**

> Homage is paid to Tite Kubo, for the wonderful characters he created and the special world he put them in. 
> 
> All my works are lyrical, literary takes on Kubo-sensei's 'Bleach'. Simply because basing a manga's world on feudal Japanese culture was a literary coup that unfortunately for Kubo-sensei but fortunately for me, was left undeveloped.


End file.
